


Two By Two

by eosandselene



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Miraculous Ladybug Fusion, Donghyuck is Ladybug, Jaemin is Chat Noir, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26513944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eosandselene/pseuds/eosandselene
Summary: Jaemin and Donghyuck have been tentative almost-friends for two years. Chat Noir and Ladybug have been superhero partners working together to save Paris for the last year and a half. There's a lot more overlap there than they think.
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Na Jaemin
Comments: 7
Kudos: 57
Collections: nahyuck fic fest!





	Two By Two

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to my beta who didn't get to beta all of this because I'm a huge mess so if you see any mistakes they are all my own
> 
> ALSO if you are french, especially if you are from Paris, I would like to sincerely apologise, this is so incredibly inaccurate ;;

Na Jaemin has never been normal.

That's not him trying to be quirky, it’s just the truth. His father is Paris’ top fashion designer and his late mother was lauded as one of the best opera singers in the last fifty years. He grew up surrounded by the glitz and glamour afforded to the rich and famous. 

His entire life has been broadcast to the public, from his first baby steps, to his modelling career began in childhood, to the university he will hopefully be attending in a few months. He has lived for almost eighteen years and he hasn't felt like a typical child even once.

So it stands to reason that his private life would be less than normal also.

_Of course_ , he thinks as he stares over the city from his perch on the eiffel tower, _when most people say they have an abnormal private life, they probably don't mean that they have a double life as a cat themed superhero._

This isn’t how he imagined he’d be spending his second year of university. He thought he would be busy studying, hanging out with Jeno, and wasting all his free time in front of his laptop.

But it’s like his spiderman comics always said - with great power comes great responsibility, and there’s nothing like waking up to an ancient deity eating camembert on your fresh laundry for ‘great power’.

Not that he had realised Jisung was an ancient deity at first - honestly, even after he had introduced himself as a kwami, Jaemin thought he looked more like the pokémon meowth than anything else. A vaguely humanoid cat, small enough to fit in the palm of Jaemin’s hand. He was adorable.

With Jisung came the power of the cat miraculous, a magical power that hadn’t been given out to anyone in centuries. It gave him super strength and super agility and a mild healing factor, as well as his own special attack, cataclysm - the ability to destroy anything his ‘claws’ touched.

Cataclysm could only be used once every four hours or so, and he could only transform into Char Noir for five minutes at a time without taking a four hour break, but still. He had _magical super powers_. 

So, really, Na Jaemin has never been normal, and he's pretty happy about it too.

  
  
  


There is sweat dripping uncomfortably down Jaemin’s forehead, creeping under his mask and getting into his eyes. He wants nothing more than to whip his mask off and dunk his head under a tap, but Ladybug is still in front of him. As much as he wishes they didn’t have the stupid _no-revealing-civilian-identities rule_ , he will still uphold it. Ladybug is one of the best people Jaemin has ever met, and he won’t betray his trust like that.

The museum worker that they just de-akumatised has long since left, gone with the police to go through their regular not-evil-anymore checks.

No one ever actually gets arrested, as far as he’s aware. Ladybug made it pretty clear to everyone the first time an akuma attack happened that this was the fault of the villain Hawkmoth and not the innocent civilians who were turned into his slaves, and people of Paris trust Ladybug.

_Jaemin_ trusts Ladybug. Whoever he is under the mask, it’s someone Jaemin is happy to call a friend.

Speaking of Ladybug, he’s currently sprawled out on the floor, panting.

“Hey,” Jaemin says, leaning on a pillar and making no attempt to move. “You want some help over there?” 

“Ugh, lord no. Just leave me here to _die_.” He lifts his hands up over his head slightly then lets them flop back down. “I have a history test on Monday that I haven’t studied for. I should have let Hawkmoth kill me.”

Jaemin freezes. “Oh _fuck._ ”

“What?” Ladybug lifts his head quickly. “What’s wrong?”

“I have a test on Monday too.”

Ladybug looks at him pityingly. Or at least, Jaemin thinks it’s pity. It’s hard to tell with a mask covering half of his face.

“Here’s an idea,” Ladybug says. “What if we run away? We don’t have to take any tests ever again if we leave Paris.”

He laughs, but he doesn’t completely hate the idea. Ladybug is one of his best friends, and his Dad will kill him if he fails another test. “I’m not opposed to that idea. Where should we go?”

Ladybug smiles at him. “I hear Canada is pretty nice this time of year.”

“Ah yes,” Jaemin crows. “The land of moose and maple syrup and… moose.”

Ladybug laughs. It’s not the prettiest sound, more of a cackle than anything else, but it fills him with pride and reminds him of someone else he knows. Donghyuck has a laugh just like it. It’s loud and airy and warm and—fuck, no, now is not the time to start thinking about Donghyuck.

He’s distracted from his pining by Ladybug hoisting himself up off of the floor and dusting himself off. He’s thumbing with the wristbands that connect the sleeves of his costume to the gloves, and Jaemin notices the softly flashing red and black buttons - probably the Ladybug equivalent to his Chat Noir ring. “I don’t have long.”

Jaemin checks his ring and is shocked to see the last claw flashing dangerously. Their fight must have gone on longer than he had thought, he too has a little under a minute until he stops being his superhero alter ego and slides back into regular old Na Jaemin.

“Me neither,” He says, waving his ring at Ladybug, sadly. “It appears that our time is up, my lovebug.” The pet name causes a full bodied cringe from his partner, but really there’s only so many nicknames Jaemin can make out of ‘ _Ladybug_ ’, and he’s determined to give him one no matter what. At the beginning of their partnership he had tried out what must have been hundreds of names, but LB had turned them all down.

“I have a name, you know,” Ladybug mutters. “But I suppose it’s better than _my lady_.”

_My Lady_ had been Jaemin’s first attempt at a nickname, and by far the least successful. The misgendering had been the biggest problem, but also back then their relationship had been less defined and Ladybug had thought he had been flirting in earnest. Nowadays he mostly sticks to ‘LB’, but that doesn't mean he can't still get creative occasionally. 

“Would you rather I called you my Lord,” he purrs, and Ladybug sighs and flips him off, fondly.

“I’d rather you got out of here before you transform back into yourself, you menace. And don’t forget to study over the weekend!”

Jaemin cackles and turns around to find the nearest nook or cranny that he can de-transform in. He doesn’t bother saying goodbye—they’ll see each other again soon. As long as Hawkmoth is on the rise, looking for people to akumatise, Ladybug and Chat Noir will be there too, kicking butt and saving the day.

  
  
  


The worst part about needing a magical girl-esque transformation to take you from your civilian identity to your superhero identity and vice versa is that bodily functions get tied to one and don't carry over.

So, instead of going from Chat Noir to Jaemin Na and going on his merry way, Jaemin is struck by the overwhelming and inescapable need to _pee_ , the same urge he’d been trying to deal with when the akuma attack first began.

He, of course, does the only logical thing and finds the nearest bathroom. Luckily, it isn’t his first time at this museum - he came here on a school trip a couple of months ago, and he remembers where the bathrooms are.

People are starting to trickle back in now that the akuma threat is over, so Jisung has to hide in his jacket pocket. On the plus side, id does mean that no one notices him sneaking to the front of the building.

He’s only steps away from finally reaching the bathroom when the door slams open and a boy steps out. His hair is a soft blond-brown and he’s tugging a red flannel shirt on, fiddling with the cuffs.

Jaemin is so surprised to see Lee Donghyuck here — he could have sworn he was back at school, where he himself had been until everyone got the standard emergency akuma alert text. Donghyuck is just as pretty as he always is, soft features and sharp eyes glancing around as he strides towards the exit.

Jaemin is so overwhelmed with Donghyuck’s beauty (and the need to pee) that he doesn't immediately notice what the other boy is fiddling with — a pair of red and black spotted cufflinks, designed to look like buttons. Identical to Ladybug’s miraculous charm.

Well, _fuck_.

  
  
  


He doesn’t go back to class.

That’s not exactly a problem, since students are allowed to leave school up to three hours early if they have reason to believe that they will be akumatized, or if a member of their family has been caught in an attack. It won't be hard to convince the school secretary that his father was near the museum, and his father… well. He won't contradict Jaemin’s story.

It does mean that Jeno has been blowing up his phone for the last fifteen minutes with concerned texts. He shoots back a quick ‘ _I’m fine, dw <3 _’, then turns his phone off. He’s not in the mood to talk right now, not even with his best friend.

No one knows exactly how akumatisation works, not even Jisung. One moment you’re a person, feeling particularly strong negative emotions, and the next minute the evil villain Hawkmoth is inside your head, turning you into his zombie-like slave.

Anyone can be akumatized and re-akumatized, and Jaemin is so grateful that shock isn’t considered a negative emotion, because he doesn’t think he’s ever felt anything as strongly as this. It wouldn’t do for one of the saviours of Paris to be akumatized. And there’s no way he can look Donghyuck in the eyes right now without freaking out.

So, he doesn't go back to class. He doesnt go home, either. His father almost certainly wouldn’t be there—Jaemin has barely seen him in months, which is probably just as much to do with him becoming Chat Noir as it is his father’s workaholic tendencies.

Instead, he makes his way across Paris to the patisserie.

Even though the patisserie is owned by Donghyuck’s brother and his brother’s fiance, Jaemin knows he won't run into his crush here. Donghyuck spends his Friday afternoons with Renjun, studying in the school library.

(A voice at the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like Jeno notes how borderline creepy it is that he memorized Donghyuck’s schedule, but he bats it away. He didn’t realise Donghyuck was Ladybug, so he’s clearly not that obsessed.)

He pushes the door open gently and is greeted with the warm smell of yeast and dough and happiness. The afternoon sun casts its rays through the window, throwing a golden shine over everything, and all the shock and confusion sitting on Jaemin’s chest ebbs away into the soft ache of nostalgia.

It was in these hallowed walls that he had first met Donghyuck.

Thinking about Donghyuck right now makes his head hurt, so instead, he sidles up to the counter, peering at all the fresh pastries on display.

“Shouldn’t you be in school?” Jaehyun asks from behind the counter, where he’s flicking listlessly through a textbook instead of whatever it is he’s supposed to be doing.

“I won’t tell if you don’t,” Jaemin says, pointing at the textbook. “I’ll have one double espresso and a mille-feuille, please.”

“You’ll have whatever I give you, brat,” Jaehyun says, shooing him away to his usual window seat, but he’s smiling so Jaemin reckons he’s fine.

Jaemin has known Jaehyun almost as long as he’s known Donghyuck. He met them both almost two years ago, a little bit after the death of his mother and a little bit before kwamis and Chat Noir.

He had been stumbling around Paris one evening in the rain, running away from some particularly vicious paparazzi, and had taken refuge in the first warm looking shop he had seen. At the time, Donghyuck had been the one behind the counter.

It was clear that fifteen year old Donghyuck had no clue who he was, but he offered him warm tea and a pastry anyway, and when Jaemin realised he had no money on him, Donghyuck had waved him off, insisting that it was on him.

He‘d returned a few days later to pay him back, only to find newly-employed Jaehyun behind the counter. They’d gotten along surprisingly well, and now the bakery is his go-to place whenever he’s stressed. The amazing pastries definitely help.

Jisung doesn’t quite agree. “Why did we have to come here? Shouldn’t we be, oh, I don’t know, _talking to ladybug_?” he asks from where he’s hidden in Jaemin’s bag.

“Why on earth would we do that?” Jaemin asks, baffled.

“Why on earth wouldn’t we?”

“Jisung, it may have escaped your attention, but Donghyuck - but _Ladybug_ doesn't want us to know his identity. It would be kind of a dick move to just waltz up like, hey, I know we agreed to keep this a secret but I actually know exactly who you are, lol! anyway, how about that chem test, huh?”

Jisung scoffs. “First of all, no one says ‘lol’ anymore. I'm several thousand years old and even I know that. Second of all, we've already crossed that bridge! You already know who he is! Isn’t keeping that from him worse, in the grand scheme of things?”

He has a point, but Jaemin still isn't fully convinced, besides, Jisung has never cared that much about his and Ladybug’s relationship before, so it’s a little bit suspicious that he cares so much about Jaemin talking to him now. 

When he asks Jisung why he suddenly cares so much now, Jisung rolls his eyes. “I don't care about Ladybug. I mean, he seems nice enough, but I’m tired of not talking to Chenle - “ he freezes the second the name is out of his mouth, and Jaemin pounces on the opportunity.

“Chenle?” he crows, “Who on earth is _Chenle_?”

His kwami goes red in the face and starts stammering, something Jaemin has never known him to do in the year and a half that they’ve been together.

Luckily for Jisung, Jaehyun wanders over with his order then, so Jaemin doesn’t get a chance to interrogate his kwami. Instead, Jisung tucks himself further into Jaemin’s school bag and ignores all attempts to get him out again.

He refuses to say anything more about Ladybug or the mysterious Chenle for the rest of the weekend.

  
  
  


Jaemin considers not coming into class on Monday.

Not for very long, though; there’s no way his father would let him stay at home unless he was seriously sick, and he’s not that much of a coward that he’d fake being sick just to avoid seeing his crush-slash-hero-partner.

Besides, what would be the point of studying just to skip the history test?

After all, he spent the entire weekend freaking out, surely he’ll be able to act like a normal human being around Ladybug— around _Donghyuck_ , for seven hours, right?

Unfortunately, his heart has other plans.

He barely makes it three steps into the classroom before he and Donghyuck make eye contact. Donghyuck reacts the same way he always does when he and Jaemin have any kind of unprompted contact, by looking away really quickly. Jaemin is stuck staring at his pretty, round head in awe.

Before, back when he was sure that Ladybug was some infinitely cooler, older man who was capable of crazy time management, Ladybug had seemed so untouchable. Now that he knows it’s Donghyuck—soft, tired Donghyuck who is just as stressed as him— well. His tiny crush might be veering dangerously close to l-word territory.

The more he thinks about it, the more it makes sense. _Of course,_ Ladybug and Donghyuck are the same person. They both have the same quick-witted sense of humour, the same analytical mind. When Donghyuck gets a question right in class, his smile is the same as Ladybug’s. They have the same cackle of a laugh.

If he’s being brutally honest with himself, Jaemin can admit that he’s not taking this news as well as he should be. It’s not a bad thing, for Ladybug and Donghyuck to be the same person, but for some reason, he feels…. Wrong. Uncomfortable. Voyeuristic. He has no clue how he’s going to make conversation like a normal human being when the only thing he can think of is Donghyuck strolling out of that bathroom, looking tired and weary but still with that typical Ladybug determination.

God, how many times has he wondered what Ladybug is like out of the mask? And the answer has been in front of him the whole time. His brain is going haywire.

To make it worse, Jeno will be out all morning - a doctors appointment followed by a private dance competition. There will be no one around to fill in the pauses and the awkward gaps that already come with making conversation with his crush.

He should say something, he thinks as he slides into his seat behind Renjun. It wouldn’t be that hard to reach over and tap Donghyuck’s arm. He and Renjun are sitting shoulder to shoulder in front of him. It would be _so easy_ to say something.

The last morning bell chimes and their teacher strolls into the room, and Jaemin’s chance is ruined.

All of his morning lessons pass by in a blur. He has notes scrawled in his notebook but he can’t for the life of him remember what he’s written. It’s all just static, and to top it off, he’s no closer on deciding if he’s going to tell Donghyuck that he knows.

When the lunch bell goes, he doesn’t move. He has library books to return and he didn’t pack a lunch so he has to go to the cafeteria but he can’t stop thinking.

He trusts Ladybug implicitly. He would have spilled his secret identity a hundred times over by now if he thought LB would let him. And that’s where the problem lies! Because Ladybug, because _Donghyuck_ , doesn’t want to swap identities. Donghyuck wants to stay anonymous. If Jaemin screws that up now… then he doesn’t know if Donghyuck will forgive him.

He can admit that a part of it is his silly teenage heart. No matter how outlandish it is, he can’t help but want - want, donghyuck, want a relationship that’s more than what they have now. He wants to hold Donghyuck’s hand, wants to take him on cafe dates and river walks and kiss him in the louvre and devour him whole, consume every part of him like they are one being. And maybe it’s stupid but every time Donghyuck chooses to look away instead of maintaining eye contact, he feels like it’s possible. Telling Donghyuck he knows about Ladybug would ruin any chance of that, he’s sure.

It’s more than that, though. Donghyuck might stutter through their conversations and constantly break eye contact, but Ladybug doesn't. He laughs with his whole body at Jaemin’s dumb jokes, pulls him in for hugs and lets him know when he’s crossed a line. That’s not a Jaemin thing, but a Chat Noir privilege, and it’s one he’s terrified to lose.

There’s a rapid clicking noise and he blinks a few times to see Renjun’s hand in front of his face. ”You’ve been staring at the back of Hyuck’s head for the last five minutes. Are you okay?”

Sure enough, Donghyuck is looking at him too, hands fiddling with one of the several lunchboxes he and Renjun have splayed out in front of them. Sharing lunch boxes is something they’ve done for as long as Jaemin can remember. They share their pencil cases and water bottles, too.

He laughs nervously and looks at Donghyuck through his eyelashes. “Uh, yeah, sorry. I guess I’m just hungry.”

Donghyuck gives him an odd look. “Oh… do you want one?” He asks, holding out his smaller lunch box. It’s filled with a handful of the fancy schmancy, teeny tiny macarons that Jaemin knows the Lee family bakery is famous for. They're the sort that his father has served along with the hors d'oeuvres at fancy events but never eats himself.

“Oh! No, no, you’re fine,” Jaemin says. It's a lie. He wants one desperately, and he’s pretty sure Donghyuck can tell, but they have way too much sugar in and if his father found out he’d broken his diet for a macaron, he’d never hear the end of it.

“If you’re sure,” Donghyuck says, turning back to his homework. “Help yourself if you change your mind, though.” 

He looks away. Donghyuck has always been so hesitant around him as if he’s a baby bird that gets spooked too easily. Donghyuck has always been skittish around him, ever since they met.

Actually… if Jaemin really thinks about it, that's not true.

Jaemin sighs and packs up his things. His library books won’t return themselves.

  
  
  


When he arrives back in class, a minute before the bell rings, Donghyuck is back to ignoring him. He doesn’t get the chance to be upset though, because there, perched on his desk, is a folded napkin. It’s made of thick paper, the fancy kind, and it’s patterned with tiny flower heads. Jeno is still at his dance competition and Renjun and Donghyuck, one row behind him, are both focused on Renjun’s sketchbook. No one is around to answer his many, many questions. He unwraps it, slowly.

It’s a macaron.

“A macaron!” Jaemin laments over the phone, later that evening. “He gave me a macaron!”

Jeno laughs, used to Jaemin’s Donghyuck induced breakdowns. “He gave one to Renjun, too. Try not to get ahead of yourself, babe.”

Jaemin looks down at his desk, at the unfolded napkin he’s halfway through framing. He’d pressed it in between the pages of his history textbook so it wouldn’t get crumpled on the way home, but now he’s thinking that might have been a weird thing to do.

“It’s different, though!” He insists, tucking the half framed napkin under some maths worksheets. “He gave one to me unprompted.”

“I’m pretty sure the prompting was you staring at him like a lost puppy.” Jeno giggles. “What’s up with that? You’re usually more subtle with your crush.”

Jaemin pauses. It’s not like he can tell Jeno the real reason! _Oh, well, you know, I’m actually one half of Chat Noir and Ladybug, and it turns out that Donghyuck, you know, my crush and our classmate, is the second half! Funny that! Anyway, I’m sorry I haven’t said anything before but being Chat Noir is an anonymous sort of gig, you understand, right?_ “Yeah,” He says instead. “But he’s just so _pretty_!”


End file.
